All Stories

What Bird Woke Me?

What could be more pleasant than waking to the sound of bird song?

Sleeping in, for one thing.

One weekend morning, my eight-year-old woke me up with, "Dad, a bird woke me up."

"Welcome to my world," I said.

Then I heard it: two clear notes; the second one lower.

I once witnessed an experienced birder in a forest identify a dozen birds in a few minutes, just from their songs.

But I am not that birder. If you know almost nothing about birds, how do you figure out the song of an unseen bird?

My wife has an app on her phone that can identify music that is playing, which is quite astounding but no use for birds.

Turns out there is an app for that.

But I don't have a smart phone and I wasn't sure when we would next hear the song for it to be recorded.

About a hundred years ago, a musical naturalist named F. Schulyer Mathews described bird song in musical notation and new version has come out called The Music of Wild Birds.

My daughter figured out the notes on her guitar. But I couldn't figure out how to make use of that information.

Birders seem to use mneumonics to remember bird songs, but if you don't actually know what they sound like, they often don't help much.

And many sites include the bird songs of birds, in case you want to learn them all. Which I didn't.

So we were stuck. Until one afternoon our backyard, we saw a bird on a wire, singing the song.

My daughter drew a sketch of it (now she claims she could have done a better one.)

false

We flipped through a bird book and decided it was probably a Black-capped Chickadee.

I thought they only said their name, "chickadee-dee-dee."

But it turns out, they have a more extensive repertoire.

The song I heard is usually described as "fee-bee," though I never would have guessed that.

They use the song to establish territories and they can distinguish fine details in each other's songs.

So it seems, these bird songs can have much more to them than meets the ear.

Any birders have some tips on identifying bird song?

About the sticker

Survivors

Artist: Jeff Kulak

Jeff is a senior graphic designer at Science World. His illustration work has been published in the Walrus, The National Post, Reader’s Digest and Chickadee Magazine. He loves to make music, ride bikes, and spend time in the forest.

About the sticker

Egg BB

Artist: Jeff Kulak

Jeff is a senior graphic designer at Science World. His illustration work has been published in the Walrus, The National Post, Reader’s Digest and Chickadee Magazine. He loves to make music, ride bikes, and spend time in the forest.

About the sticker

Comet Crisp

Artist: Jeff Kulak

Jeff is a senior graphic designer at Science World. His illustration work has been published in the Walrus, The National Post, Reader’s Digest and Chickadee Magazine. He loves to make music, ride bikes, and spend time in the forest.

About the sticker

T-Rex and Baby

Artist: Michelle Yong

Michelle is a designer with a focus on creating joyful digital experiences! She enjoys exploring the potential forms that an idea can express itself in and helping then take shape.

About the sticker

Buddy the T-Rex

Artist: Michelle Yong

Michelle is a designer with a focus on creating joyful digital experiences! She enjoys exploring the potential forms that an idea can express itself in and helping then take shape.

About the sticker

Geodessy

Artist: Michelle Yong

Michelle is a designer with a focus on creating joyful digital experiences! She enjoys exploring the potential forms that an idea can express itself in and helping then take shape.

About the sticker

Science Buddies

Artist: Ty Dale

From Canada, Ty was born in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1993. From his chaotic workspace he draws in several different illustrative styles with thick outlines, bold colours and quirky-child like drawings. Ty distils the world around him into its basic geometry, prompting us to look at the mundane in a different way.

About the sticker

Western Dinosaur

Artist: Ty Dale

From Canada, Ty was born in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1993. From his chaotic workspace he draws in several different illustrative styles with thick outlines, bold colours and quirky-child like drawings. Ty distils the world around him into its basic geometry, prompting us to look at the mundane in a different way.

About the sticker

Time-Travel T-Rex

Artist: Ty Dale

From Canada, Ty was born in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1993. From his chaotic workspace he draws in several different illustrative styles with thick outlines, bold colours and quirky-child like drawings. Ty distils the world around him into its basic geometry, prompting us to look at the mundane in a different way.